Rating: 
Summary: Behind the scenes of the Apollo moon program
Review:
This book is essential reading for anyone who wants to
understand the world of NASA contracts and how the Apollo
moon shot developed. Through a fast-paced biograhical account of the life of Harrison Storms, author Mike Gray reveals how the people who made the moon landing happen met
and conquered seemingly insurmountable problems in every facet of the program. Seeing the moon program through the
eyes of the prime contractor gives you a unique perspective;
quite different from what you read in the official
government history, but nevertheless even more patriotic
and dedicated to achieving the goal of landing a man on
the moon.
Gregory R. Bennett
Founder of the Artemis Project
Rating:
Summary: The Real Story about Apollo Technology
Review: Angle of Attack is simply the best book on space history I have read. I enjoyed the opportunity to get behind NASA's pr and see the true story of how the spacecraft and associated technology were built. I have read this book over 10 times and still can't put it down.
Rating:
Summary: A good, if biased, tale.
Review: Apollo was a huge project, and most books about it cover but a narrow piece of the tale. This book is no exception, being a history of North American's role in building the spacecraft for Apollo, and in part a defense of North American's role in the disasterous Apollo pad fire.But it's a good, well-researched book that belongs in any space flight fan's bookshelf.
Rating: 
Summary: An interesting behind the scenes look at aerospace.
Review: Having both my parents work in the aerospace industry in the 60s, I found this book quite intriquing. It goes beyond the inner fighting between all the competing companies, and captures an era, when men wore the pants in the family and mothers were expected to raise the kids. My parents both worked extremely long hours, including weekends, when deadlines were being met. I never understood all the secrecy around the house until I read this book. Angle of Attack also touched on the lay-offs and hiring, as well as the trading and competition of employees between the numerous aerospace companies. Many aerospace workers went from Rockwell to Autonetics to Hughes Aircraft to North American etc. in their quest to keep a job. This book brought all those memories and hardships back to me. The aerospace industry was responsible in large part for the development of Orange County, once farmland covered with orange trees, it became street after street of tract homes needed fo! r the aerospace workers. This book was a delight for me to read, fiction or non-fiction, it captures an era.
Rating:
Summary: Hero later; First came the skilled folks in the trenches.
Review: Here's a great "engineer's read". Mike Gray's Angle of Attack primarily focuses on the behind the scenes story of the men and women of North American Aviation during the development of the Apollo command module and the second stage of the Saturn launch vehicle. But the author makes sure we understand the greater context by relating the roots of space exploration by seamlessly folding in the story of Germany's V2 rocket of the World War II era, and the work at the beginning of the 60's with North American Aviation's X-15 High Altitude Research Plane. And of course it's the story of Sputnik, Eisenhower, the creation of NASA, and a glimpse at just what it was like, at the height of the Cold War, when the two Superpowers, with nuclear missiles pointed at each other, embarked on a race to see who would be the first to put a man on the moon.
Rating:
Summary: Hero later; First came the skilled folks in the trenches.
Review: Here's a great "engineer's read". Mike Gray's Angle of Attack primarily focuses on the behind the scenes story of the men and women of North American Aviation during the development of the Apollo command module and the second stage of the Saturn launch vehicle. But the author makes sure we understand the greater context by relating the roots of space exploration by seamlessly folding in the story of Germany's V2 rocket of the World War II era, and the work at the beginning of the 60's with North American Aviation's X-15 High Altitude Research Plane. And of course it's the story of Sputnik, Eisenhower, the creation of NASA, and a glimpse at just what it was like, at the height of the Cold War, when the two Superpowers, with nuclear missiles pointed at each other, embarked on a race to see who would be the first to put a man on the moon.
Rating:
Summary: This is a great "case study" for project management.
Review: I am a project manager on large software development projects. I found this book to be a wonderful case study into the management of technical people. There has never been a more complex and pressure-packed project than Apollo. This book provides lessons for project managers today. Most importantly, have clear objectives and don't let up
Rating:
Summary: A "MUST" FOR EVERY LIBRARY ON APOLLO
Review: I am aware that this book has been called "pro-North American Aviation (NAA) propaganda", but even if it is slanted in their favor, it is still very well worth reading. The book gives the background of legendary aerospace leader Harrison Storms and NAA starting from his windtunnel work after the attack on Pearl Harbor, demonstrating the feasiblilty of launching B-25 bombers off the deck of an aircraft carrier which enabled Jimmy Doolittle to carry out his audacious raid on Tokyo, through the development of the famous P-51 Mustang, F-86, and F-100 fighters, up to the Mach 3 B-70 bomber and X-15 rocket plane. Based on this wealth of experience, Storms persuaded NAA to form the Space and Information Systems in Downey, California and to make a serious bid for the contract to build the Apollo spacecraft which was ultimately succesful. Unfortunately, the Apollo 1 fire which took the lives of astronauts Grissom, White and Chaffee in 1967 tarnished the reputation of Storms and NAA and led to questioning whether NAA should have been given the contract at all, but based on the successes of the past, NAA was well qualified to build the spacecraft as the astronauts who were picked to fly it felt at the time. The weakness of the book is that it seems to give full backing to Storms' contention that nothing at all was wrong with the way things were done at Downey. In fact, the books written by Mike Collins, Frank Borman and Chris Kraft point out that they were unhappy with NAA before the fire but the immense time pressure to get to the Moon before 1970 led people at NAA and NASA to sweep problems under the carpet until it was too late. The most fascinating parts of the book describe the various technological challanges that had to be overcome in building the spacecraft, such as how Monte-Carlo methods were used to determine the "worst-case" scenarios the Command Module could encounter on landing in the ocean so that it could be designed to protect the astronauts, the packing of the landing parachutes which required compressing them in a vacuum chamber so that they could fit in a very small space, and the extreme weight limitations on the S-II second stage of the Saturn V moon rocket which required breakthroughs in many new manufacturing technologies and materials science. I found this book to be very inspiring in showing how a vast team of talented people can come together and do something great.
Rating:
Summary: A "MUST" FOR EVERY LIBRARY ON APOLLO
Review: I am aware that this book has been called "pro-North American Aviation (NAA) propaganda", but even if it is slanted in their favor, it is still very well worth reading. The book gives the background of legendary aerospace leader Harrison Storms and NAA starting from his windtunnel work after the attack on Pearl Harbor, demonstrating the feasiblilty of launching B-25 bombers off the deck of an aircraft carrier which enabled Jimmy Doolittle to carry out his audacious raid on Tokyo, through the development of the famous P-51 Mustang, F-86, and F-100 fighters, up to the Mach 3 B-70 bomber and X-15 rocket plane. Based on this wealth of experience, Storms persuaded NAA to form the Space and Information Systems in Downey, California and to make a serious bid for the contract to build the Apollo spacecraft which was ultimately succesful. Unfortunately, the Apollo 1 fire which took the lives of astronauts Grissom, White and Chaffee in 1967 tarnished the reputation of Storms and NAA and led to questioning whether NAA should have been given the contract at all, but based on the successes of the past, NAA was well qualified to build the spacecraft as the astronauts who were picked to fly it felt at the time. The weakness of the book is that it seems to give full backing to Storms' contention that nothing at all was wrong with the way things were done at Downey. In fact, the books written by Mike Collins, Frank Borman and Chris Kraft point out that they were unhappy with NAA before the fire but the immense time pressure to get to the Moon before 1970 led people at NAA and NASA to sweep problems under the carpet until it was too late. The most fascinating parts of the book describe the various technological challanges that had to be overcome in building the spacecraft, such as how Monte-Carlo methods were used to determine the "worst-case" scenarios the Command Module could encounter on landing in the ocean so that it could be designed to protect the astronauts, the packing of the landing parachutes which required compressing them in a vacuum chamber so that they could fit in a very small space, and the extreme weight limitations on the S-II second stage of the Saturn V moon rocket which required breakthroughs in many new manufacturing technologies and materials science. I found this book to be very inspiring in showing how a vast team of talented people can come together and do something great.
Rating:
Summary: real story
Review: I found this book especially fascinating because it shows the race to the moon from a totally different perspective. Not the astronauts, not the people at huston mission control; the people who actually designed and developed that great engine that takes mankind to the moon. I am an engineer in space technology, and I can imagine (on a very, very limited scale, naturally !) what amount of work, dedication, and enthusiasm was necessary to do that job.
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